A few weeks ago, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia released a declassified version of a judge’s ruling in the case of Al Rabiah, a Kuwaiti citizen who has been held at Guantanamo for seven years. The judge, Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, found that the government could not credibly support its allegation that Al Rabiah was part of the Taliban or al-Qaida, and that the evidence against him wasn’t sufficient to justify his continued detention. She ordered the government to release Al Rabiah “forthwith.”

But the judge’s opinion is more than a legal document; it’s also a window into the interrogation process at Guantanamo and the risk that “enhanced interrogation techniques” will produce false information.

via Judge’s Finding Highlights Risks of Abusive Interrogations at Gitmo – ProPublica.

What are the excesses being looked at? In several cases, detainees died as an apparent result of their jailers’ acts. One froze to death, chained to the floor of an unheated cell in the Afghan winter. Another died after his interrogator bludgeoned him with a flashlight. (That was the one case that did prompt prosecution; the interrogator was convicted.)

There’s no question that serious misconduct occurred; the CIA says all of the interrogators being investigated were disciplined for breaking the rules — rules that permitted waterboarding, ramming heads against walls and other “enhanced interrogation techniques.” The question now is whether any of their rule-breaking deserved criminal prosecution — and whether the Bush administration made the right calls when it decided not to prosecute.

Holder hasn’t had a lot of support for his investigation. A few Democrats in Congress and, oddly, former Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales applauded the move, but not the White House, where some aides privately made it clear that they wished the attorney general’s conscience hadn’t bothered him so much.

via Eric Holder’s military allies — latimes.com.

“The judge deferred wholesale to the CIA’s determinations that information that is very similar to what the CIA has already released should remain secret,” he said. “We think the history of this case makes clear that the CIA has continually used national security as a pretext for keeping secret embarrassing information and information about illegal government activity. “

via VOA News – New York Federal Judge Denies Request For CIA Secret Documents.

“Had Mr. Holder honored the pledge made by the president to look forward not backwards, we would still be active participants in the committee’s review,” Bond said in a statement.

“Instead, (the Department of Justice) sent a loud and clear message that previous decisions to decline prosecution mean nothing and old criminal charges can be brought any time against anyone.”

via Bond quits Senate panel reviewing CIA actions – STLtoday.com.

There is no statute of limitations on murder, and some detainees were unquestionably murder victims having been tortured to death. Would Mr. Bond give these murderers a free Get Out of Jail card?

Dick Cheney insisted that two CIA analytical reports (that he apparently pressed to have prepared) concluded that his torture techniques rendered positive results. But these reports were declassified and published, and lo, they don’t say what he claimed they do.

via Torture Doesn’t Work, Neurobiologist Says—By Scott Horton (Harper’s Magazine).